Long time Crusieboysians will recognize my surprised and awestruck tone, but today was “Lobster Buffet” day for lunch.
Panama Canal Story
Here’s one of the “insider” stories our Panama Canal lecturer told us. In the 1910s the Atlantic and Pacific locks had just been constructed and closed, so the at-that-time largest man-made lake was slowly filling up to the (then) 85 feet (25 m) depth. People then noticed that one of the hills, which was rapidly becoming an island, was slowly darkening. After a few days of this a couple of engineers took a rowboat out to see what was going on. Seems there were tens of thousands of tarantulas climbing the trees trying to escape the rising waters. They eventually lost, as this hill/island was less than 85 feet high. Our lecturer concluded, “In the decades I lived in the Panama Canal region I never saw a tarantula – perhaps that is why.”
The locks built in 1914 defined the size of vessels that could transit the Canal, which were thus defined as “Panamax“.
- Length – 950 ft (289 m)
- Beam – 106 ft (32 m)
- Height – 190 ft (58 m)
- Draft – 39 ft (12 m)
- Capacity – 5,000 containers
In 2016 Panama opened a new lock system designed to support larger ships, called “Neopanamax”
- Length – 1200 ft (366 m)
- Beam – 168 ft (51 m)
- Height – 190 ft (58 m)
- Draft – 50 ft (15 m)
- Capacity – 14,000 containers
No post in the last few days due to me not feeling well. I even missed my Panama City tour. But I’m on the mend, and tomorrow is Ecuador.